The resolution, which backs an Arab League plan for political change in Syria, made two significant omissions to meet Russian demands. It left out a specific requirement that Syria’s president, Bashar al-Assad, step down; and it jettisoned a provision for a voluntary arms embargo. Russia is a major supplier of weapons to Syria.

Even so, Russia’s deputy foreign minister, Gennadi M. Gatilov, said Friday that the resolution did not go far enough to bring his country on board.

“We still have a number of concerns because of the essence of this text, and we will be prepared to continue consultations on the draft resolution,” Mr. Gatilov told the Interfax news agency. “ We are willing to continue the work on its finalization, taking into account and proceeding from our principled positions.”

Mr. Gatilov did not outline any specific objections to the resolution, saying only that it was unlikely it would be put to a vote in the Security Council anytime soon. He also left unclear whether Russia would consider vetoing the measure or simply abstaining from the vote.

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In Washington, a State Department spokesman, Mark Toner, said that Secretary Hillary Rodham Clinton had spoken with her Russian counterpart, Sergey V. Lavrov, on Friday morning, and that they had agreed to continue to consult on the draft.

Moscow is keen to preserve Syria’s lucrative market for Russian arms, especially now that its weapons contracts in other Middle Eastern countries, particularly Libya, are in question. Russia also maintains an important naval base at the Syrian port of Tartous, giving the Russian fleet access to the Mediterranean Sea.

Also significant is a sense among Russian leaders that they were deceived by the Security Council resolution that paved the way for the NATO campaign in Libya. Russia, which abstained from voting on the measure rather than vetoing it, believes that NATO overstepped its mandate by, officials here say, actively seeking to oust Libya’s leader, Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi, by force.

The drafters of the latest resolution sought to specifically alleviate this concern by including a paragraph that rules out any authorization of Article 42 in the United Nations Charter, a provision that allows for the use of force “to maintain or restore international peace and security.”

Russia has tried to intervene in the conflict unilaterally, announcing this week that it had persuaded Mr. Assad’s government to participate in informal talks with the opposition in Moscow. The Syrian National Council, an umbrella group of opposition to Mr. Assad, promptly rejected the overture.

Russia has called on the opposition to assume partial responsibility for the violence in Syria, something anti-Assad forces and many Western governments have rejected.